Why is liquidity on Matchbook so poor?

[Sawyer]

I like to ask this question as well!

In baseball season, liquidity was fine. Now, liquidity is very poor even in NBA! NBA is far more popular than baseball but you can find good liquidity specially in totals.

Still, I love Matchbook. Odds are much better than sportsbooks. If we can get more people involved, we will have more liquidity. Therefore, I hope MB gets more members in future. Tell your friends to join MB

[DeluxeLiner]

I wish Matchbook was easier to fund

[Jaug]

The liquidity on NCAAB was absolutely poor yesterday.

[thespeculator]

I like to ask this question as well!

In baseball season, liquidity was fine. Now, liquidity is very poor even in NBA! NBA is far more popular than baseball but you can find good liquidity specially in totals.

Still, I love Matchbook. Odds are much better than sportsbooks. If we can get more people involved, we will have more liquidity. Therefore, I hope MB gets more members in future. Tell your friends to join MB

exactly , during baseball season the lowest you would see on a game is around 8000, and some games were around the 20000 area, so it is very surprising for to hear now

[Pareto]

This was basically answered already. The commission structure used to be so that you only paid commission on what you won. Now you pay commission on every offer you accept.

Under old structure, if you bet 10K at +102 on both sides, you win $200 and pay $4 in commission. Under the new commission structure (assuming you were accepting offers), you would win $200 and pay $200 in commission. Not ideal for a market maker/scalper.

But a market maker would not be accepting offers, but rather making offers. And therefore the new commision structure should suit him fine.

[bookie]

If they offered more of a rebate for offering their liquidity would increase as well.

How much more rebate could they possibly afford to offer? They're only holding .8% of the acceptors' bet now--and if they jacked the one percent price up they wouldn't really be a discount alternative.

[sinkhole]

This was basically answered already. The commission structure used to be so that you only paid commission on what you won. Now you pay commission on every offer you accept.

Under old structure, if you bet 10K at +102 on both sides, you win $200 and pay $4 in commission. Under the new commission structure (assuming you were accepting offers), you would win $200 and pay $200 in commission. Not ideal for a market maker/scalper.

100% commission

[Pokerjoe]

Also, about the line changing problem: it's possible that sharp outs, like Pinny, have accounts at MB, so that, a moment before they change their own line, they pick off offers at MB.

In any case, posting offers there is problematic for normal players.

[trumpdown]

I'm not sure it is problematic overall just that I am losing money in the sense I could be making more money with this other direct software or "bots" which at this time I know very little about. I still make offers in-game all the time and never have had a problem besides my one time bloody mistake. With in-game, everything can move quite fast with higher liquidity so having all the tools would be nice I agree, but overall for us Americano's there isn't a better alternative besides marrying some broad from another country or finding a "friend" to set you up there which would have other obstacles to overcome.

But even the Euro exchanges like BetFair talk about "bots" and how to apply them with their software. As stated I just joined but to me it is a no brainer to learn something knew, and overall save a **** load versus -110 lines.

Just fund one of the books they do transfers with roll it over1x and learn how. Start betting $1 until you get the hang of it.

[Dunder]

But even the Euro exchanges like BetFair talk about "bots" and how to apply them with their software. As stated I just joined but to me it is a no brainer to learn something knew, and overall save a **** load versus -110 lines.

Just fund one of the books they do transfers with roll it over1x and learn how. Start betting $1 until you get the hang of it.

Market makers armed with trading bots have been actively encouraged by Betfair pretty much from day one and have been integral to its success. Any exchange lives or dies on liquidity.

In the days before the Premium Charge introduction, I recall watching bots ´fighting´ each other in just about the most obscure market you could find. It was a Swedish floorball match. In a period of 3 or 4 hours in excess of GBP 700,000 was matched. I sincerely doubt that 1 penny of that was someone actually having a bet. Just traders, trading.

When you think about it though, it´s pretty much the same in FOREX markets, where trillions are traded every day, the vast majority is automated trading, bank A v bank B.

It is my distinct impression that if there is a problem with Matchbook it is not a lack of people willing to trade or seed markets, it is that there just aren´t enough ´public´ bettors who use the exchange.

From this side of the pond, that seems illogical but there are some good reasons mentioned in this thread and obviously these are things that Matchbook needs to address.

[TomG]

yeah this liquidity sucks

[KC]

At 8pm before a crappy Jet game I counted over a quarter million in action availabe, very impressive!!

[sinkhole]

how does the bots work?
how can they just trade, they have to know how the line will move?

[Dunder]

how does the bots work?
how can they just trade, they have to know how the line will move?

Without giving too much away, a good bot will be highly configurable and will be sensitive to the weight of money on each side. They can also be linked to other data sources e.g. xml feeds from books.

It should also be bourne in mind that for big events, liquidity and volume on Betfair is so huge that it defnes the line and the books will be tracking that, not vice versa.

[mminkovski]

OK, so for NFL games there is a good liquidity

[Doug]

NBA H2 can be tough to match , esp. on totals.

[coldhardfacts]

I like to ask this question as well!

In baseball season, liquidity was fine. Now, liquidity is very poor even in NBA! NBA is far more popular than baseball but you can find good liquidity specially in totals.

Huh?? No effin way the NBA is more popular, much less FAR more popular, than baseball. Especially while pro and college football are still going strong.

I think the continuing downturn in the economy is a major factor in the lack of liquidity. LV is hurting, AC is hurting. People are just running out of money.

[SPECULATOR 13]

the matchbook api is generally available to anyone that asks for it

Thanks for the tip durito ,as soon as i figure this thing out i'll ask for it from MATCHBOOK,

Bots which have API access will almost certainly be first to get the best offers (including mistakes).

A bot is a program which makes or takes offers based on whatever parameters are set by the user.

Direct access to the API (bypassing the matchbook.com website) allows the user or bot to ´see´offers made almost immediately. This does mean that a bot will often have accepted your offer, or part of it, before the matchbook.com screen refreshes.

Dundy be a pal will you? where can i get a bot?
witch one do you recommend?
For someone like myself who strictly plays and swear by EXCHANGES this kind of thing is must! I will endeavor to learn them.

[Dunder]

In all honesty, I don´t know whether there are any bots which are commercially available for Matchbook. The ones that are in operation there were mostly likely created by the users themselves, this is certainly what I intended to do.

I have a home made bot which I use on Betfair, which has evolved over 6 years or so, but there are 15-20 popular bots (mostly for scalping) which you can buy to work with Betfair. These though are not compatible with Matchbook.

[SPECULATOR 13]

thanks dundy i found the betfair bots website,so now i gona start learning,durito said that matchbook will provide the bot if you ask for it.?!
i'll ask than?
good luck today old chum

[Dunder]

thanks dundy i found the betfair bots website,so now i gona start learning,durito said that matchbook will provide the bot if you ask for it.?!
i'll ask than?
good luck today old chum

Not quite. What Matchbook will provide is only access to the API, basically just the ability to use a faster trading screen/platform. As mentioned, I really wouldn´t know where to get a bot for Matchbook.

If you are new to this, you will find it very daunting. But stick with it, practice with small stakes/exposures and watch what your bot is doing in order to refine/correct it´s activities.

[Fishhead]

yeah this liquidity sucks

[sdtrader]

it's the in game liquidity that sucks before game is still ok, but I mainly like to trade in game

[ArunSh]

No one seems to be questioning that the NFL games get great liquidity, what concerns me is the other markets (like live markets) and NBA markets (especially totals) seem to have much less liquidity than last season.

[sinkhole]

who are the ppl that puts up $30 000+ in NBA second half...?
in almost every NBA second half there will be $30k+ on one side, and it just one guy

[jebe99]

A question to Durito, Dunder, or anyone in the know,

What is API that you guys are talking about in context to Matchbook. I'm not too computer savvy.
Thanks in advance.

[ArunSh]

who are the ppl that puts up $30 000+ in NBA second half...?
in almost every NBA second half there will be $30k+ on one side, and it just one guy



Yeah I've often wondered this myself. Wonder who does that...

[Ian]

A question to Durito, Dunder, or anyone in the know,

What is API that you guys are talking about in context to Matchbook. I'm not too computer savvy.
Thanks in advance.

I'm interested in this as well.

[Johnny 55]

Hope Matchbook makes some changes soon.

[patswin]

good stuff in this thread

[Dunder]

A question to Durito, Dunder, or anyone in the know,

What is API that you guys are talking about in context to Matchbook. I'm not too computer savvy.
Thanks in advance.

Think of the API as being the order book. With it the user can see, in real-time, all of the offers that have been made/matched. It is therefore very useful for those that are wanting to trade/seed markets especially in-play when markets tend to move quickly/often.

The standard Matchbook platform on their website is fine if your just placing bets or making offers but refreshes too slowly for traders IMHO.

To effectively use the API data, you still need an application that allows you to make and take offers (I honestly don´t know whether Matchbook offers one as I intended to create my own).

[Ian]

Think of the API as being the order book. With it the user can see, in real-time, all of the offers that have been made/matched. It is therefore very useful for those that are wanting to trade/seed markets especially in-play when markets tend to move quickly/often.

The standard Matchbook platform on their website is fine if your just placing bets or making offers but refreshes too slowly for traders IMHO.

To effectively use the API data, you still need an application that allows you to make and take offers (I honestly don´t know whether Matchbook offers one as I intended to create my own).

Thanks for the response, Dunder.

[TodayIsForgotten]

who are the ppl that puts up $30 000+ in NBA second half...?
in almost every NBA second half there will be $30k+ on one side, and it just one guy



Yeah I've often wondered this myself. Wonder who does that...

I need to put some many back into MB. I remember a few years back when tenn was playing cal in football. Tenn was underdogged by +14 or 14.5. I see someone offer a +1800 line with 134 dollars on it. I could not believe what i saw. So i dropped 100 dollars on tenn. Then another line goes up +2400 with 24 dollars. I take the 24 and wound up making (with my original bet) 2857 on 300 dollars. It was a glorious day.

I never really did the math but im sure whoever lost that money was pretty pissed.

[Dunder]

I never really did the math but im sure whoever lost that money was pretty pissed.

Betfair, a soccer match with team A leading 3-0 with about 5 mins. to play

Someone offered to back Team B GBP 50,000 at 1.01 (-10000). Needless to say it was snapped up in seconds and was obviously a mistake. I can imagine he was pretty pissed too.

In-play exchange trading is the law of the jungle, but at least it is one where there are no bad line disputes and everyone knows the rules.

[Kaps]

who are the ppl that puts up $30 000+ in NBA second half...?
in almost every NBA second half there will be $30k+ on one side, and it just one guy



Yeah I've often wondered this myself. Wonder who does that...

In my opinion, whenever I see a large 2ndhf offer of 30k or more on something
I believe it to be a sportsbook that has an acct at MBK ....and I think im right

Because when you see a line like that you will not attempt to bet that way